At present, news coming out of Belarus is marked by two particular refrains: the economic crisis and a search for national consolidation. These refrains may be interrelated since negative macroeconomic trends, coupled with a lack of structural reforms that would boost the private sector, make Belarus overly dependent on Russia. And in the absence of a unifying national idea, it would be difficult to resist Russia’s alleged temptation to incorporate Belarus. “The Crimea-like outcome,” writes Yury Drakakhrust of Radio Liberty in his by-weekly column for Tut.by, Belarus’s largest privately owned news and analysis portal, “can be achieved by various means. …read more
Source: The Jamestown Foundation